![]() The Government is raising the age of eligibility for Newstart from 22 to 25.The youngest people to be affected by the gradual rise in pension age will be people born after 1 July 1952. The pension age will rise to 70, as foreshadowed before the budget, but not until 2035, and so will only affect Australians born after 1966.And the Commonwealth will dramatically cut its support for various state- and territory-based seniors' concessions, eliminating $1.3 billion in spending.The Seniors Health Card will be harder to qualify for, with the untaxed superannuation of new applicants now counting toward the income test.Pensioners will also be hit by the return to indexing the fuel excise, with lower income earners spending a higher proportion of their income on petrol.Commonwealth Seniors Health Card holders will lose the Seniors supplement, which currently sits at $876.20 per year for singles and $1,320.80 for couples.This will be waived after 10 visits per year for concession card holders. Pensioners will be affected by a $7 co-payment to see a GP.People on Newstart under the age of 30 will only be eligible for payments six months out of every 12 months they are unemployed. Families will also be expected to provide greater financial support for adult children for longer, with the age of eligibility for Newstart to be raised from 22 to 25, and school leavers being forced to waits six months to be eligible for Youth Allowance.Medicines on the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme will also be more expensive, with patients paying a $5 fee – or 80 cents for those on concession cards.Hospitals will also be allowed to charge for visits to emergency rooms by patients with ailments that only require a visit to a GP.After 10 visits, patients with concession cards and children under 16 will be exempt from the fee. Families will be negatively affected by the introduction of a GP co-payment of $7 ($5 of which the Government will take), for the first 10 visits to the GP per year ($70).Families will also be hit by increases in the petrol excise, which will now be indexed to inflation every six months.All family benefits will also remain on hold until either 2016 or 2017, resulting in a loss of income in real terms, as it will no longer take into account increases in inflation.Previously the Family Tax Benefit B extended to families with children under 18 that will now be cut off for families where the youngest child is six or older.The Government has reduced the cut-off for Family Tax Benefit B to $100,000 from $150,000.
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